Where Leaves Fall Not
by valinorean
Summary: :: For Revision :: Story of why Legolas tarried in Middle-earth...from another's point of view. :: Haldir/Legolas SLASH :: Unbetaed, written in 2002


**AN:** I got this idea when a friend told me that there are too few slash fics between Legolas and another elf, saying ANYONE will do as long as it's an elf. So I tried looking for an elf for Legolas, unfortunately there are only a few mentioned in LotR, so I tried for Silmarillion (that's where I got the idea for EldaQuenta, my other fic). I completely forgot all about the Lórien elves! So here's one for them ^^

**Disclaimers:** Tolkien owns every character I used here.

**WARNING!** SLASH! Don't read it if you're not into it. I'm not forcing you to read this.

**Pairing:** Haldir/Legolas

* * *

**Where Leaves Fall Not  
**_by valacirca _

* * *

_To the Sea, to the Sea! The white gulls are crying,  
The wind is blowing, and the white foam is flying.  
West, west away, the round sun is falling.  
Grey ship, grey ship, do you hear them calling,  
The voices of my people that have gone before me?  
I will leave, I will leave the woods that bore me;  
For our days are ending and our years failing.  
I will pass the wide waters lonely sailing.  
Long are the waves on the Last Shore falling,  
Sweet are the voices in the Lost Isle calling,  
In Eressëa, in Elvenhome that no man can discover,  
Where the leaves fall not: land of my people for ever! _

_~ Legolas' Song of the Sea _

* * *

_**January 3019  
Lórien **_

_It has been a very strange journey indeed. I am now in one of the most unlikely places I could ever be and have befriended the most unlikely people. _

_Me, the son of Gloin! A dwarf of the Lonely Mountains has befriended an elf! And I sit now here in what _they_ call a talan, high above in the trees. _

_Peculiar people these elves are. I would have rather stayed in the ground and fight a hundred orcs, but Aragorn would not hear of it. _

_I know it is highly unusual, but this quest that has been appointed to us is also unusual. After we have escaped from Khazad-dûm, Aragorn insisted we enter Lórien. Of course I refused to enter this enchanted forest. But it seems that both Aragorn and Legolas are familiar with these woods and I am but one dwarf. _

_And now I refuse to sleep even if my body longs for rest. If half of what my people say about the Lady of the Golden Wood is true, then we might not be able to see the dawn break, let alone the quest completed. _

_So I pretended to sleep. While the rest of the Fellowship are fast asleep, something quite interesting happened. It seems to me that this Haldir we met earlier have been quite a close friend of Legolas in the past…_

The elf silently made his way to the other side of the talan. He sat down beside another elf looked up the heavens. The two elves watched the stars for a while until one broke the silence.

"Do you still refuse to talk to me, Haldir?" said the elf.

"I did not say that, it's just that we have nothing to speak of."

Legolas sighed.

"It was not my fault," pleaded Legolas. "My father would not let me out of Mirkwood since the end of the war. And there I would have stayed until a hundred times the golden leaves of Mirkwood fall, had Gollum not escaped."

Haldir could only glare.

"You could have sent messengers, you know," hurt was evident in his voice. "They told me that the entire army of Oropher who fought at the eastern end of Dargorlad was slain. After the war, I searched the battle plains, I searched for days but I cannot find you."

Haldir bowed his head and leaned upon Legolas' shoulder. The grief he carried over two thousand years was resurfacing. Elves no longer cry for the sorrows of the world have hardened them, but they have not closed their hearts either. They carry the grief with them through the ages of the world and it is their sorrow that has made them beautiful.

Legolas wrapped his arms around Haldir and stroked his golden tresses. His lips found no words of comfort, for the only comfort he can give was the truth.

"That time, my grandfather Oropher deemed it best that he fight in my stead," the elf started to explain. "He said that if I fight in his stead, our people will protect me more, thinking that I am the King of the Silvan Elves of Northern Greenwood. He died trying to protect me."

Haldir held the other elf close and felt the burden of immortality fall from his shoulders. He felt young again, it seemed as if it was only yesterday that he held his lover this close, before the rise of the Dark Lord Sauron.

"Promise me one thing," Haldir murmured through his lover's hair. "Promise me that you'll come back after this quest is done."

He felt Legolas hold his breath, then exhaled slowly. When he heard no answer, he looked up searching the eyes of his lover. He saw pain.

"I dare not make that promise," Legolas said.

"I could not bear to lose you a second time," Haldir pleaded with his eyes. An age was enough to heal him, but the scars cannot be erased.

Earlier, when he saw Legolas again after more than two thousand years, it was all he could do not to break in front of everyone. It would not do to have others know of this, for after all, Legolas is a Prince in his own land.

"I'm sorry," whispered Legolas. "I dare not make a promise I might not be able to keep."

Haldir knew what he must do, but has not the heart to do it. Legolas knew too, that it should have been this way. They should have spared each other the pain, a long time ago.

Such is the gift of Ilúvatar to the elves. Beauty, wisdom and to live in greater bliss in Middle-Earth so long as it exist, but to endure what comes with it.

With forced determination, he faced his lover.

"So be it," he said. "I am already weary of this world. I shall be in the next elven-ship that will pass over the Sea. If I shall meet you again in Valinor or in the Halls of Mandos, I shall only hope that you have been happy with your life."

Haldir pressed his lips lightly against his lover's. A soft fleeting kiss that conveys a message of goodbye. With that, he stood and walked away, not looking back. He did not see the single tear that rolled off Legolas' eye.

_Indeed I was surprised, for I have never seen an elf cry. Not even when Gandalf died did I see him shed a tear. _

* * *

_**Spring 3041  
Fangorn Forest**_

_Never have I seen Legolas look this young. Or maybe the term should be "_feel_ this young." _

_I've never seen him smile this much…except before the night I saw him talking to that elf in Lórien. He kept singing and singing that I wondered how the rest of the Company was able to sleep that night! _

_And now I am here again, dragged off into the woods by this elf that I call friend. Of all the woods in the world, he decided he wanted to go here, Fangon forest! _

_Peculiar these elves are I tell you. _

_Giant walking trees! It's bad enough that they creeped me out the first time I saw them, fortunately Gandalf was there and I felt safe. But now, there's only two of us and he wanted me to leave my axe! _

_I swear if I get out of here alive, I'm taking him to the Glittering Caves and we'll stay there till he suffocates! _

_Speaking of elves, we heard news that the last elven-ship was sailing West. I know not much about these elves, but I do know that they go and sail over the Sea and never return. Legolas sing so much about the Sea whenever we got near the shores that sometime I wonder if I have suddenly learned how to speak elvish and understand these songs. _

_I seem to remember something about the "call" of the Sea and the Lords of Valior and what not. Aw crap, I think I'm the most elvish dwarf there is. _

_But anyway, I asked him about that… _

"I have reasons for staying, Gimli," the elf said to his friend. "The Fellowship is very important to me, even after we have defeated the great evil. And as long as the Fellowship lives, I have no reason to depart with this world."

"So what then?" replied the dwarf. "What will you do after everyone is dead? Waste yourself in your grief and die? You know, we'll do just fine here by ourselves. There's no more danger, besides I'm still here to look after them. You're too stubborn you know that?"

"I think your stubbornness has rubbed off on me, Master Dwarf," replied the elf humorously.

_I knew he was lying._

_No, elves never lie. But he is not telling the truth either. _

_I know how much he longs to go to the Elven-home, had it not been for his fear. _

* * *

_**March of 1541 SR  
Minas Tirith in Gondor **_

_I finally got to knock some sense into him. Yes, he is far too stubborn to have done this on his own. Or perhaps he is living in denial. _

_He has told me everything. We have been for decades, as unlikely as that seems for a dwarf and an elf. Perhaps because it is that he feared to make friends with those who die easily, like the race of men. _

_Just like he feared to love again, because he could lose them just as easily, but more painfully. _

_And over a silly thing too, and I told him so. And he hit me on the head with the shaft of arrow he was whittling. _

_This is getting ridiculous, even for him. He feared that if he goes to Valinor, he'd find out that his lover already found another. _

_And how would he know if won't go there? He'd rather waste here in pointless grief than find out the truth. Of course it would be painful if he was right, but at least he'd be able to move on. _

_Another peculiar thing about these elves too, they are overly emotional when it comes to these things. I could never understand how they think. It was so simple! _

_Even in death, the Fellowship have given him support… _

"You don't have much of a choice," the dwarf explained. "Its either you stay here where you'd live to see the end of the Fellowship or go across the Sea and find your fortune there."

"Both would be very painful for me," replied the elf. "But I do not want to see the rest of the Fellowship gone. We are the only ones left."

Both the elf and the dwarf are in Gondor, where they laid the body of their friend, Aragorn, beside their other comrades, Merry and Pippin, in Rath Dinen. Gondor is now ruled by Elessar's heir, Eldarion.

In his death bed, Aragorn have counseled the elf to obey the call of the Sea, before he turned to speak to Arwen and departed from this world.

But it seems that the last words of Aragorn gave him strength and hope, for he is Estel[i]. And it seemed to him that the way is clear. He would go forth to Valinor.

"Elessar is right," the elf finally said. "I would have to go to the Elven home across the Sea."

"Took you long enough to realize that," the dwarf muttered. "But I think you're missing a point here. You realize that it's too late for that, the last ship has gone. I've been badgering you to go years ago!"

The elf could only smile.

"You do realize I am of Telerin descent, right?" the elf grinned.

"Of course!" the dwarf replied. "You only remind me, say, every time we go near a body of water. What are you getting at?"

"We, my friend, would build a boat and sail over the Sea."

"We?" the dwarf choked out. He didn't know what shocked him more, the fact that his friend have obviously lost his wits, or the suggestion that _they_ build the boat.

"Of course! Do you honestly think that I'd leave you here on Middle-Earth?"

* * *

_**I lost count of the days, they have none here.  
Alqualondë in Valinor **_

_I don't know what possessed me at that time to agree to go with him. Maybe it's because I long to see again the face of one called Galadriel, the Lady of the Golden Wood that was once Lórien. _

_Or maybe it's because I long to see my friend happy. He has been miserable long enough, although he doesn't show it. _

_I am glad I came with him. I'm glad I was able to see the end of _their_ story. Maybe we could use the end of Bilbo's story here too. _

_"And they lived happily ever after." I don't think I need to put "until the end of their days" in here, for who knows when the world will end? They might get to live longer than that. _

"I'm glad I came," said Legolas as he launced himself in his lover's waiting arms.

"Took you long enough…again," replied Haldir smiling.

"I'm going to disappear somewhere," the words of the dwarf went unnoticed by the reunited lovers.

"Promise me this," Haldir said. "Promise me you'll never leave me again."

"I swear, I won't." And with that Legolas' lips descended softly on his lover's.

_I have said before that it was their sorrow that made the elves beautiful. I was wrong. It is nothing compared to when they are truly happy. _

* * *

_~~ excerpt from the Journal of the son of Gloin, Gimli, the dwarf who reached the Undying Lands~~ _

* * *

[i] I don't have my RotK now with me, but if I remember correctly, there's a passage in the Appendix that says that his mother calls him Estel, meaning hope. She said something like 'I give hope to the Dunedain, but hope I have none' or something like that. Please correct me if I'm wrong.


End file.
